"Let us go and sit in the shade," said Lord Henry. "Parker has brought
out the drinks, and if you stay any longer in this glare, you will be
quite spoiled, and Basil will never paint you again. You really must not
allow yourself to become sunburnt. It would be unbecoming."

"What can it matter?" cried Dorian Gray, laughing, as he sat down on the
seat at the end of the garden.

"It should matter everything to you, Mr. Gray."

"Why?"

"Because you have the most marvellous youth, and youth is the one thing
worth having."

"I don't feel that, Lord Henry."

"No, you don't feel it now. Some day, when you are old and wrinkled and
ugly, when thought has seared your forehead with its lines, and passion
branded your lips with its hideous fires, you will feel it, you will
feel it terribly. Now, wherever you go, you charm the world. Will it
always be so? . . . You have a wonderfully beautiful face, Mr. Gray.
Don't frown. You have. And beauty is a form of genius-- is higher,
indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. It is of the great
facts of the world, like sunlight, or spring-time, or the reflection in
dark waters of that silver shell we call the moon. It cannot be
questioned. It has its divine right of sovereignty. It makes princes of
those who have it. You smile? Ah! when you have lost it you won't smile.
. . . People say sometimes that beauty is only superficial. That may be
so, but at least it is not so superficial as thought is. To me, beauty
is the wonder of wonders. It is only shallow people who do not judge by
appearances. The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the
invisible. . . . Yes, Mr. Gray, the gods have been good to you. But what
the gods give they quickly take away. You have only a few years in which
to live really, perfectly, and fully. When your youth goes, your beauty
will go with it, and then you will suddenly discover that there are no
triumphs left for you, or have to content yourself with those mean
triumphs that the memory of your past will make more bitter than
defeats. Every month as it wanes brings you nearer to something
dreadful. Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and your
roses. You will become sallow, and hollow-cheeked, and dull-eyed. You
will suffer horribly.... Ah! realize your youth while you have it. Don't
squander the gold of your days, listening to the tedious, trying to
improve the hopeless failure, or giving away your life to the ignorant,
the common, and the vulgar. These are the sickly aims, the false ideals,
of our age. Live! Live the wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be
lost upon you. Be always searching for new sensations. Be afraid of
nothing. . . . A new Hedonism-- that is what our century wants. You
might be its visible symbol. With your personality there is nothing you
could not do. The world belongs to you for a season. . . . The moment I
met you I saw that you were quite unconscious of what you really are, of
what you really might be. There was so much in you that charmed me that
I felt I must tell you something about yourself. I thought how tragic it
would be if you were wasted. For there is such a little time that your
youth will last--such a little time. The common hill-flowers wither, but
they blossom again. The laburnum will be as yellow next June as it is
now. In a month there will be purple stars on the clematis, and year
after year the green night of its leaves will hold its purple stars. But
we never get back our youth. The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty
becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into
hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passions of which we were
too much afraid, and the exquisite temptations that we had not the
courage to yield to. Youth! Youth! There is absolutely nothing in the
world but youth!"

Dorian Gray listened, open-eyed and wondering. The spray of lilac fell
from his hand upon the gravel. A furry bee came and buzzed round it for
a moment. Then it began to scramble all over the oval stellated globe of
the tiny blossoms. He watched it with that strange interest in trivial
things that we try to develop when things of high import make us afraid,
or when we are stirred by some new emotion for which we cannot find
expression, or when some thought that terrifies us lays sudden siege to
the brain and calls on us to yield. After a time the bee flew away. He
saw it creeping into the stained trumpet of a Tyrian convolvulus. The
flower seemed to quiver, and then swayed gently to and fro.

Suddenly the painter appeared at the door of the studio and made
staccato signs for them to come in. They turned to each other and smiled.

"I am waiting," he cried. "Do come in. The light is quite perfect, and
you can bring your drinks."

They rose up and sauntered down the walk together. Two green-and-white
butterflies fluttered past them, and in the pear-tree at the corner of
the garden a thrush began to sing.

"You are glad you have met me, Mr. Gray," said Lord Henry, looking at him.

"Yes, I am glad now. I wonder shall I always be glad?"

"Always! That is a dreadful word. It makes me shudder when I hear it.
Women are so fond of using it. They spoil every romance by trying to
make it last for ever. It is a meaningless word, too. The only
difference between a caprice and a lifelong passion is that the caprice
lasts a little longer."

As they entered the studio, Dorian Gray put his hand upon Lord Henry's
arm. "In that case, let our friendship be a caprice," he murmured,
flushing at his own boldness, then stepped up on the platform and


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